Normally when I play through Shining Force, I have one consistent party. Just choose 12 characters, and stick with only using them. However, lately I've been thinking about trying the game by switching my party members around battle to battle depending on what's tactically needed. Lots of rough terrain? Use flying units and those who can move through forests. Plenty of tactical vantage points? Use archers to attack from a distance. Fighting a boss? Bring heavy hitters, and maybe an extra healer. I think it could be a neat way to play the game, while also making every party member (or at least most) feel like they belong as part of the Force, rather than just being recruited only to be ignored.

I wonder if anybody else has ever tried playing similarly before, and if it even worked out at all, or just resulted in most party members simply being underpowered. Asking of course with the mind set of not stopping to grind at all to compensate for party members missing out on EXP by not being present in every battle.

Use flyers at Bustoke camp and Uranbatol fort, knights and Zylo at Laser Eye, archers and Guntz at forest battles...Can't say it turns the game easier (or harder), but it just seems fun and makes sense to play that way.

I don't use every character though.Just swap like three or four of them depending on the battle (a tank for a knight, an archer for a bowknight, a flyer for a mage, a warrior for a healer...)

I wouldn't really expect it to make the game easier, to be honest. Just think it would be neat to actually try to consider who would be useful where, and use characters accordingly. Make the team feel more like a full fighting force for once, and also make some of Nova's advice feel a bit more relevant with how he sometimes recommends using certain types of units in certain situations. Although I feel like missing out on battles could result in some characters winding up too far behind to be of any use without a bit of grinding, but I'll have to see.

Part of it also is that while I would typically use a centralized team throughout an RPG, I've lately been finding myself more drawn to using everybody rather than just picking a select few and sticking with them. Did the same sort of thing in both Forbidden Series 6, and Thousand Arms recently for the first time where, instead of just choosing 4/3 characters to use the entire game (then grinding the others for the final dungeon in FS6), I consistently swapped my party around depending on things like who needed levels, or who's abilities would be more useful in certain situations. Made the games a lot more fun to have a constantly changing team, and in turn needing to frequently adjust my strategies accordingly rather than just doing the same thing battle after battle with the same characters from start to finish. After those experiences, I'm curious to see how Shining Force would play out doing the same sort of thing.

I probably won't use everybody, though. I imagine some characters would fall way too far behind without constant use (especially Arthur and his constant need for babying until late levels he'll never reach without), but I'd also probably avoid using some universally overpowered characters like Zylo and Domingo in battles where they're not specifically useful in order to keep them from hogging EXP like they usually do. That way other characters who aren't being used as frequently have a chance to get some levels when they are used to hopefully not fall too far behind.